


Where It Hurts

by Dracze



Category: Batman (Comics), DCU (Comics)
Genre: Bad BDSM Etiquette, Batjokes, Behind the Scenes, Blood and Violence, Canon-Typical Violence, Character Study, Dark, Erotic Violence, Fucked Up, Horror, Ignored Safeword, M/M, POV Second Person, Relationship Study, Villain PoV
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-31
Updated: 2019-10-31
Packaged: 2021-01-31 19:55:27
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,603
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21250961
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Dracze/pseuds/Dracze
Summary: The Batman Who Laughs has a proposition for Joker. It doesn't quite go as planned.(A behind-the-scenes look at "Metal" #6 and what might have happened after Bruce left Joker and The Batman Who Laughs alone in the cave.)
Relationships: Joker (DCU)/Bruce Wayne, The Batman Who Laughs | Earth-22 Bruce Wayne/Joker
Comments: 23
Kudos: 196





	Where It Hurts

**Author's Note:**

> As you can see, I'm still alive, and trying to get back into the groove of not just writing but also posting some of what I wrote. This is the first step to force myself back in the game, and it seemed fitting to post this particular piece on Halloween. 
> 
> It's dark, folks. **PLEASE** heed the warnings and give this one a pass if it seems like it may not be your thing. The noncon elements aren't explicit or graphic and rape doesn't actually happen, but I'm doing this from TBWL's POV and he fantasizes about it at some point. He also ignores an explicit order to stop when he tries to amp up the erotic violence, and (willfully) misinterprets Joker's signals in some pretty gross ways, so including the big warning seemed apt.
> 
> There's also plenty of violence and blood, as befits these particular characters and their canon. It's probably the most brutal thing I've ever published.
> 
> Both the noncon elements and the violence are part of the character study and are crucial to illustrating how I think this version of Bruce would approach Joker, and why Joker _hates_ him. This fic is basically a writing exercise where I tried to make sense of TBWL as a version of Bruce, and finding ways in which they're both different and similar kind of led me... here. So. You know. Continue at your own discretion. 
> 
> That all said, I hope you enjoy it if you do read it. As always, let me know what you thought, I'm super grateful for feedback! 
> 
> (Updates and more new stuff coming soon)

The bleeding stumps of your fingers streak red-brown lines across the Joker’s face while you struggle with him on the floor of the cave. The pain is worth it — the smears look good on him. Artistic. 

(But then, blood always did.)

You try to do it again, and he lets you, grinning wide while you paint his mouth dark with your blood.

You take him in: his bloodied face, so close to yours, and then his eyes, and doesn’t that just take you back. This one’s different in countless little ways that stand out against your memories like a scream, and you can’t quite decide if it delights or infuriates you. The point is, you know better, and sure, he’s not _him_ — he can’t be him. 

But the eyes betray him. They’re the exact same in all the ways that matter, tipping you over to see right past the superficial and into his very core, into his essence, and that — that’s the same, too. It’s all you really need. He may not be your Joker but he's pulling you into his gravity just as easily, bringing the trembling world around you into a crisp, sharp focus the way only he’s ever been able to do. 

His pupils are blown the way you remember they always got when they met yours. The green around them blazes wild and bright, burning with passion that, up close, looks remarkably like acid, and you smile at this because you know, now, that they’re one and the same. 

You remember what it felt like looking into those same eyes a whole lifetime ago, and catching the exact moment when the light in them went out. You remember holding him as his body sagged in your arms, just before the green smoke hit.

His pupils were blown back then, too.

His face hovers above you now as his familiar body twists and writhes against you like a wild thing, trying to stab, trying to duck, trying to hurt. He’s giving it his all, the way he always has, and you know you need to stay on your guard — that he’s dangerous to you even now. But you can’t stop _looking_ at him, at his grimacing face, at the light in his eyes, at his grin, all the more beautiful now that it’s marked with your blood.

And even as you fight him, there’s… a twinge. A stir, somewhere deep in your chest, and it’s light at first but tactile, too, like the memory of a touch from years ago sending ripples all through you. And the ridiculous thing is, even now, with all your knowledge and insight and _change_, your first instinct is to try and stamp it out. To deny it, and pretend it isn’t there. 

It makes you want to laugh the moment you realize it. So you do, and you slash at him with a fresh burst of strength that would’ve killed him if he hadn’t dodged it in time.

Fascinating, isn’t it, how all those years of rigorous self-conditioning cling to you even long after you thought you’d shed them all. You laugh at your old self, at his ridiculous hang-ups and blind spots that shame you now that you know better, and then you open up to that strange stir in your chest, and you embrace it, and let it burn.

You’re past denying, isn’t that the whole point? You’re the point where denial ends, and turns into acceptance. So you will accept this, too, as you’ve accepted him, wholly, and as you accept the thought that logically follows.

He’s _intoxicating_. Always was. Even in your defeat, you can’t deny it. And you don’t want to deny it, any more than you want to deny how thrilled you truly are that he’s here, alone, just the two of you on the cusp of everything and nothing.

You’ve missed him. 

In light of all this, it's easy for you to be sincere when you tell him, “Well _done_,” a moment before you buck him off of you and roll to a crouch. “You actually managed to surprise me.”

Joker grins, getting to his feet with all the lethal, jerky grace of an apex predator that kicks up things in you that leave you aching and yearning and tingling like you’ve been scrubbed raw. He pushes sweaty hair out of his eyes and licks along the bloodied edge of his bat-shaped cleaver. 

The twinge pulls at you again as you look at the weapon, and the statement it screams. 

How… cute.

“I live to entertain,” Joker pants and dips into a bow, never taking his eyes off you. “So.” He tosses the cleaver to the other hand, deftly, showing off the way you know he can’t resist. “Another round?”

For a moment, you actually consider it. You like the way your blood pounds in you, the electrified pleasure lightning you up from head to toe, the old thrill you thought you wouldn’t get to experience ever again. You like the thought of catching him and pinning him down, and hurting him in all the ways you know he’ll like, and taking it _slow_, and finally letting the tension between you burn you both up. You never got to experience that with _him_ — he’d robbed you of closure even as he set you free. So the fact that a different Joker’s standing here across from you now, alive and breathing and ripe for the taking, feels far too much like justice. 

Your battle is all but lost. You can accept that, and without much difficulty. There’ll be other battles, and you’ve long since learned to take your pleasure where you can. Why shouldn’t you let yourself have _this_ for your consolation prize?

But the floor under your feet is trembling furiously now, and the walls are crumbling all around you. Bits of rock scatter down from the cave ceiling, hitting you both on the way down. There isn’t much time, and certainly not enough to enjoy and savour him the way you want to. 

Even so, you’ve never been one to waste an opportunity. There’s ways you can still get what you want from him and deal a blow to this Earth’s Bruce in one fell swoop, and time enough to try. 

You were going to teach this Bruce a thing or two about regret, anyway. 

Might as well start by making him regret ever leaving you two alone.

“I have a counter offer,” you say, edging towards the mouth of the cave. 

Joker notices the maneuver — of course he does — and stalks after you, sharp and deadly and so very, very appealing. 

“I’m listening,” he purrs, and there’s a curious gleam in his eyes that promises interesting things in your future if only you play your cards right.

Good enough for a start. You smile at him, letting your grin match his. 

“Want to team up with me instead?” you ask as you spread your hands wide, opening yourself up, dripping blood onto the rocks. “I’m trying to blow up the entire universe and teach your Batman a lesson about his true nature. That’s two things I _know_ are right up your alley.”

Joker doesn’t seem surprised. If anything, his smile curves into an amused arc, as though you’ve just confirmed something he’d wondered about. 

Did he expect you to make the offer? Did he _want_ you to? The possibility sends excited ripples all through you, but you check yourself in time — you know better than that. It’s not going to be this easy. He’s going to make you work for it.

“I did consider it,” Joker admits easily, moving in a wide circle so as to block your way out of the cave. “If only because I like your smile.”

Of course, he wouldn’t be the Joker if he didn’t try to stab you while he’s at it. And he does. You catch his wrist mid-swing and pull him around, and slam his body against the crumbling rock far harder than you really need to, just for the fun of it.

His grunt of pain, and the crunch of his bones, intoxicate you. You ride that high for all it’s worth and press up against him before he can slip away, smothering all air between your bodies to nothing. This close, your nose fills up with the smell of him, dirt and blood and sweat and gunpowder and acid, and you breathe it in until it’s all you _can_ smell, until it soothes that dark, hollow place deep inside you that’s been the one gaping wound that never managed to scar.

He struggles against you, even though he must realize how pointless it is. Which means he does it _for_ you, to play, to rile you up, and oh, that’s good, that’s _perfect_, and you want to reward him for it. So you catch his hands in a death grip, pulling him away from the rock just enough, and then you slam him into it again, hard as you can. 

You’re painfully hard at this point, and you welcome it, this hot, heady surge of desire that’s as ugly and dark as it is beautiful. As it is freeing. As it is inevitable. 

You want him. You want him so much, as your partner and your enemy and everything in between, and you’re never going to waste a single minute denying it again — not when you can _have_ him.

“Well this is… interesting,” Joker pants. He sounds hoarse and just a bit dazed, and he lets out a gasp that’s part pain and part surprise when you grind into him from behind, letting him know, letting him feel you, showing him exactly how different you are from what he knows — showing him what the two of you can _be_.

You shift your grip so that you’re holding both his hands in one of yours, and then you pull hard and rough at his hair. He laughs, but doesn’t fight it the way you knew he wouldn't. It feels too good for him, and he proves you right when he arches his neck so you can whisper right into it, tasting the grit off his skin. 

“I see the world as you do,” you say, pitching your voice low and deep and delighting in the tremors that wreck him in response. “And I agree. With everything. You were _right_, Joker. I see that now, and I want you by my side as I blow it all to kingdom come.”

“I bet you say that to all the clowns,” Joker manages, and lets out a moan when you kiss his throat, scraping the points of your teeth over his skin hard enough to puncture it and draw blood. 

“I’m a one-clown guy,” you tell him with a smile. “And I can give you what you want. I _want_ to, Joker. I want _you_.”

To prove it, you pull back so you can twist him around and push his back against rock as you capture him by his bleeding neck. He’s panting hard now, his eyes all but black and glazed and burning with a thousand sensations a minute. Blood is dripping from his nose, mingling with your own over his mouth, and you want to lick it off him and drink it up until there’s nothing left.

So you do. His blood tastes exactly as good as you hoped it would, but it’s his shudder that electrifies you, and the way he starts to trash against you as if he _isn’t_ enjoying this. As if he wants you to stop. 

You know he doesn’t. Not really. You can feel his hips against you as they move, jerky, furious and desperate, grinding into you as much as moving away, communicating his own want and impatience far more eloquently than any words could. 

You allow him to play at this quaint little game for as long as it amuses you, and then you pin his wiggling hips to the rock with your own.

“There,” you whisper into him, as gently as you think he can stand, and you kiss the spot on his neck that you bit, tasting more blood, letting it paint your mouth the way your blood painted his. “Doesn’t that feel good? There’s more where this came from, I can promise you that. We can do _anything_.”

You kiss his neck again, marking a path up his throat and over his jaw, partly to drive your point home and partly because it feels too good not to. He trembles against you, panting, laughing that wet, desperate laugh you recognize as his way to cope with something that’s simply too big for him to keep in.

Already overwhelmed, and you haven’t even gotten to the good stuff yet. 

That’s _adorable_. 

“I see everything you tried to get me to see,” you tell him, letting all the raw tenderness you feel for him color your voice low and deep. “You deserve a Batman who can truly keep up with you. _He_ won’t be able to do that, you know. He won’t let himself, not unless he becomes like me.”

“Perhaps,” Joker sighs against you, letting you box him in, letting you kiss him, letting you rake your teeth and nails over his bleeding neck as a promise of far better pain and pleasure to come. “Perhaps.”

“He _left_ you here,” you remind him, going in for the kill. “He doesn’t care if I kill you, just as long as he can be the hero. I won’t do that. I’ll appreciate you the way you deserve.”

“You know just what to say, don’t you,” Joker whispers, rough and hoarse, and giggles breathlessly into you when you bite his neck again. 

“Better yet, I know just what to do.” You bite on the shell of his ear as your hand moves down his chest.

He stills when it skims past his belt. Curious, but then again, this is a boundary his own Batman would never dare cross, so maybe the shock is only to be expected. All the more reason to do it then, to prove to him you mean business. You hand goes low —

“No,” he whispers against you. “Stop.”

You don’t want to. You think he might not want you to, either, that this is a test, that everything he ever _does_ is a test. 

But there’s an edge to his voice now that stills your hand halfway down his zipper with some sort of… instinct, some sort of old, half-forgotten dread that leaves you just a bit cold. 

Interesting. You thought you’d left it dead and buried along with everything else. 

It’s… disappointing. But all it means, in the end, is that apparently you’ve still got a few more remnants of old sentiments yet to smother.

“No?” you growl into his neck, powering through that twinge of old, rusty discomfort to grind up into him with enough force and violence to lift him off his feet.

He laughs, louder and hoarser than before, and tears stream down his face to mingle with the dirt and sweat and blood already painting it. He’s coughing with it when you do it again, pressing your hips together, moving your hand over the side of his hip and over his ass.

“Stop,” he repeats, and there’s that twinge of coldness in you again, and all it does is make you _angry_.

“I don’t think you mean that,” you hiss into him, gripping his ass hard enough that the stumps of your fingers howl with pain, and moving his hips against yours. “I think you’re testing me. Checking to see if I’ve still got any of your Batsy’s scruples before you make your choice. Well, I _don’t_.” 

You can feel him smile against you, just as he whispers, “You got that one right.”

He grabs your face between his hands and forces it close to his — close enough so his blood-soaked lips brush yours. 

You realize it’s a trap just moments before he surges up and bites, tearing right through the skin of your lip to the muscle tissue. The surprise of it, more than the pain, distracts you enough that you miss the flick of his wrist, and then a knife plunges into you through layers of leather and skin. 

You stagger, letting him go. He pulls away from you, taking torn bits of your mouth with him and laughing until he’s spitting blood. 

“You don’t get _anything_,” he manages through the hysterical laughter as he plunges the knife in your back, and then again, and again, and again. “I’d pity you if it wasn’t so pathetic. The only reason Batsy left me behind is because he trusts me.”

Ah. Your Joker used to believe that, too. A miscalculation on your part, then — in your excitement, you’ve underestimated the depth of his conviction. Batman has his denials, but Joker isn’t free of them either, and you’ve been away from him — you’ve been them _both_ — for so long that you forgot another crucial thing about how it used to be when the two of you existed in separation from each other. 

In so many ways, Joker’s always been as scared of change as you used to be. 

But maybe all isn’t lost yet. Joker’s sentiments _are_ more malleable. Maybe all this one needs is some stronger arguments. 

“That’s… disappointing,” you seethe, just before you twist away and punch him into the opposite wall. 

“Is it?” he goads, breathless but still laughing. “That only proves my point. If you truly got me, then you’d know exactly why I could never play with you.”

“The cycle _can_ be broken,” you insist, stalking up to him over collapsing rock and rubble. “I’m proof of that. We can change things, you and I. We can rewrite the script. You don’t have to spend your entire life begging for scraps from someone too far up his own ass to see things for what they are. I should know. I used to be that guy.”

You reach for him again, and punch him in the side of his head and kick him in the stomach to keep him down. That feels good, too, and all the more so for the nostalgic value. You pull him to his feet while he’s still too dazed and winded to resist you, and you grab him by the neck again, searching his eyes. 

“Think, Joker,” you say, gently, lovingly, caressing his face. It looks gorgeous like this, marked with bruises and dirt and blood, and you think, you’ve always loved the sight of him like this the best. “Think about what we could achieve,” you insist, warming up into it. “Think of how _good_ we could be.”

“See, but that’s exactly where you’re wrong,” he whispers, coughing, struggling in your grasp. “You didn’t rewrite a damn thing. You’re just proof that things need to stay the way they are.” 

“You—” 

Joker spits at you, and laughs brokenly in your face.

And that’s… regrettable. Not least because it means you’re gonna have to kill him now, and for a moment, you’d actually allowed yourself to _hope_.

In the end, though, that’s probably for the best. He’s just as imperfect, in his own way, as this Earth’s Batman is. Just as incomplete. And how could he be anything but? They’re both limited by being apart, by being other, when you — you are whole. You’re their ultimate form, their ultimate and inevitable _perfect_ union, and they couldn’t comprehend you if they tried. He’d only hold you back, and you’d probably end up having to kill him anyway when all is said and done.

_Mirrors_, your own Joker told you, once. Maybe it was a warning as much as anything. You wouldn’t put it past him. In any case, you think you’re beginning to understand — and that makes you _angry_.

But no matter. There are other universes, and other Jokers. Maybe one of them will see sense, and let himself be convinced. 

Or maybe you’ll just kill them all. You can't let them run amok, and it’s all one and the same to them, so in the end, you’ll be giving them what they want either way. 

Starting with this one.

You wipe your mouth, tasting his spit and blood. He watches you through it, still laughing, defiant and proud and untamed even as he dangles and writhes in your grip - and even through your anger, it does things to you, seeing him like this. Tasting his blood on your lips. The smell of him lingering, too good to let go.

He really is remarkable, and so very, very beautiful. 

So much so that killing him now, the way you know you should, suddenly feels like too much of a waste.

Especially since, all of a sudden, you’ve got a far better idea.

After all, you _could_ just take him anyway. Rewarding though it may have been to have Joker take your hand on his own, and betray his precious Batsy all in one breath, it’d feel just as good — just as satisfying — to force him, and destroy him slowly. You think about knocking him out and winding your chain around his neck, and dragging him out of this cave like a dog on a leash, and hiding him away, and then taking him apart bit by bit just to unwind after a hard day’s work. You could stretch it out for _years_. He’d appreciate it, too — it’s the kind of thing he goes in for. 

And then there’d be nothing stopping you from taking _him_, in every sense of the word, with the kind of violence Joker never allowed himself against you because it’d be crossing lines he thinks shouldn’t be crossed. It would be fitting, and so, so rewarding.

You used to dream about it. Dark, terrible, delightful nightmares that left you panting and hard to the point of pain long before the gas. Just the reminder of that torture, the frustration and guilt all confused with lust you could never shake no matter how hard you tried, is enough to make your blood _boil_, enough to want to throw Joker on the ground here and now and enact all those nightmares at once until you’re both too bruised and bloodied to move.

Then you imagine this Earth’s Bruce’s face when he finds out. When he _sees_ —

Yeah. You definitely like the idea. You need this. You _deserve_ this, for everything Joker’s done to you, and for everything he hasn’t.

This Earth’s Bruce needs the lesson, anyway. And it looks like this Joker does, too. Two for the price of one isn’t bad at all, to say nothing of that uncomfortable remnant of coldness in you you _know_ you need to eliminate.

Joker might even begin to see things your way, in the end. If you play it right. If you break him in just the right places. You’ve seen it done on other Earths, so why not here?

And you were going to destroy this Earth’s Bruce anyway. There’s no better way to start. 

You pull your arm back to deliver the hit that will take Joker out —

He kicks you in the groin just as a boulder comes loose from the cave ceiling and catches on your arm when it falls. 

The pain is nothing. You’re used to far worse than this. You rally to capture Joker again, to chase him and bring him to heel like the mad dog he is, but he’s moving fast, too fast, and grabs one of his cleavers. 

The bat-shaped blade tears into your shoulder and sticks there, stopping you short, and then he’s in your face, his mouth brushing yours, his green, toxic eyes mad and wild and filled with something you realize with a start you’ve never seen there before. 

_Hate._

“You’re broken,” Joker whispers, grasping the cleaver handle and twisting the blade until the pain of it finally catches up with you and your vision swims. “You’re an abomination. A glitch, all skewed and unbalanced and wrong. Wanna know how I know that?”

You try to twist out of his grip, but you’re too slow now. Too injured. You stumble, and he dances out of your range just enough to kick at the cleaver and lodge it even deeper inside you.

He looks down on you when he says, “When I say stop, Batsy listens.” 

You try to hit him again, to punch or kick or slash at him, anything to make him _hurt_, but he surprises you by closing the distance between you and fitting his mouth to yours. 

It’s the moment you taste the acidic compound that you realize what he’s done, and then you can’t help but laugh, too, as you collapse to the cracking floor. 

The laughing gas capsule disintegrates on your tongue within seconds, mingling with the taste of blood. It won’t hurt you. He must know that it won’t hurt you. He’s trying to tell you something, and it becomes all the more obvious when you meet his eyes and see his hate staring back. 

Is he going to kill you now? He looks like he might. It would be the smart thing to do. But even that possibility pales in comparison to the hate, so pure and genuine, that you still can’t quite get past— your own Joker has _never_ looked at you this way, not even when you killed him. 

It’s unsettling. It unbalances you even more than the pain does, especially since it makes you wonder. If your Joker saw you now, as you are…

What would _his_ eyes tell you?

But that’s exactly the sort of thinking you know you have to curb. You can’t afford to indulge in it. You don’t want to. Your Joker is dead, and soon enough, this one will be too. And then you’ll never have to see that burn in his eyes again.

“I offered you a choice,” you remind him, clutching at the cleaver sticking out of your shoulder. “Remember that when I come for you.”

“That’s what she said,” Joker parries, and laughs, and turns away. 

You lunge after him, but the pain and the blood loss slow you down, and another boulder drops between you before you can reach him. The last thing you see of Joker is his back as he starts for the mouth of the cave, towards the pulsing, blinding light.

Towards his _Batsy_, and away from you.

You can’t chase him. He’s too far away already, and there’s no time, not if you want to make it out of this cave alive. 

But that’s okay, you tell yourself over the cold, bitter sting in your chest, far more acute than the pain. There’ll be other opportunities. It’s a pity and a waste, but you know beyond a shadow of a doubt now that you’ll have to kill Joker sooner than you’d like to, and that it won’t be as easy as you expected going in. You might have to defer some of your more _personal_ fantasies for another time, and another Joker. 

No matter. You can be patient. You’ve got more than enough backup plans for now, and Joker’s given you fresh inspiration to get working on at least three of them. 

The fact that they all target this world’s Batman is just the icing on top, because you know, far better than most, that destroying Joker to get at Batman doesn’t only work one way. 

You’re going to pay him back in kind, and hit Joker where it _hurts._


End file.
